Preparing Your Hot Tub For Winter

Few things are better than staring up at a winter’s night sky while warmly cocooned in a rejuvenating hot tub. When temperatures drop, it’s the perfect time to drop everything and take full advantage of your backyard spa. If you’re introducing a hot tub into your backyard retreat this year, or already have one and want to enjoy it fully this coming winter, here are some helpful tips from Caldera Spas Product Manager Melinda Scheble.

Top 3 Tips for Keeping Your Spa Water Clean

Maintaining a Caldera spa is really as simple as following a basic weekly routine that requires very little time or effort. There are really 3 basic steps to keeping your water clean:

Set FROG® dosage based on usage: Each of our models come standard with an in-line water care system that makes it easy to keep water fresh, clean and ready for you to enjoy your spa year-round. All you need to do is shock the spa with Monarch® chlorine or Monarch MPS Plus non-chlorine shock once a week and replace the FROG mineral and bromine cartridges as needed. The purple bromine cartridge should be replaced every 2-4 weeks depending on user load and the blue mineral cartridge should be replaced every 4 months. Each cartridge is simple to set and adjust based on your personal user load. Best of all, the bromine and mineral system is gentler on your skin and requires fewer chemicals.

Rinse off before entering hot tub: Ideally, you’ll keep your water clean longer if you enter the spa fresh from a shower. Soaps and lotions are the main culprits for negatively impacting the water balance. Always strive to be lotion-free before using the spa and reduce the laundry soap used to wash your swim suit.

Drain and refill once a quarter: If you follow the first two steps above then it’s likely you’ll be able to extend the time between draining. When it’s time to replace the water, we recommend using Vanishing Act® calcium remover in areas with high calcium hardness (commonly known as “hard water”).

Hot Tub Winter Maintenance Tips

Need to close up your winter home this year? Be sure to drain the hot tub
We sell a lot of hot tubs to people with mountain homes and typically they use their hot tub more during the winter months than in the summer. If you need to shutter your winter home it’s important to drain the spa completely and take a few added measures to winterize the spa in areas where the temperatures fall below 32 degrees. We provide a step-by-step guide for winterizing in the owner’s manual provided with every spa and also available online. While the process is straight-forward, it’s really important to take the time to ensure that all water is out of the pipes and spa to prevent any potential freeze damage.

Replace Worn Cover
Every Caldera Spas hot tub is insulated with a proprietary FiberCor® insulation that improves spa performance and lowers energy costs. One of the best ways to ensure that your hot tub stays energy-efficient is to always replace a worn spa cover. The custom fitted, high-density covers from Caldera keep a tight seal between the bar top and cover to prevent heat from escaping. If your vinyl is cracked or torn, or if there’s any damage to the foam insulation, it’s definitely a good idea to replace your cover to get the best energy performance.

Let us know in the comments if you have any questions about finding your perfect fit with Caldera Spas.